SSD, You Get What You Pay For!

DIY-Computer-Repair can help!

Review of the Team 2.5" Combo SATA Solid State Disk - SSD - S25AC1

I was looking for a SSD (Solid State Drive) as an external drive. The newer SSD's have a dual function for connecting the drive to your computer. For internal you can have either SATA or IDE. Or you could put the drive in an enclosure and have an external drive. Then the higher cost drives that were SATA came with a USB 2 port.

Now the lower cost SATA drives are coming with a USB 2 port. Needing a drive I bought a 64 Gig drive.

So I bought a 64 Gig SSD (Team 2.5" Combo SATA Solid State Disk - SSD - S25AC1 ) from a company in Ireland. The SSD is made by a company in Taiwan, Team Group Inc. It was DOA (Dead On Arrival), it took me about an hour to find the company that made the drive. I sent an email to the company I bought it from but they would not accept it back - ie: opened packaged electronics are not returnable. So I learned two lessons from this little experience - READ the return policy before buying and do NOT buy cheap.

Yup failed to follow my own advice - again.

After tracing down the manufacture the fun begins.

For over two weeks (I am in the US of A and Taiwan being on the Pacific Rim when I am up and working they are closed down for the night.) I would wait until after 10 PM my time to correspond (no phone support out side of Taiwan) with the customer service, then the support people of Team Group Inc. After four days of emails we finally came to the conclusion the device need to be shipped back to Taiwan for repair.

Now I am a little peeved not for the cost ($18 not cheap but it cost me $89 to send a mother board back for repair in the US of A) but the time lag. The fastest that the device can get to Taiwan is one week! It was faster to buy it from Ireland! Ok I send it back to the manufacture. And I wait. And wait. By now the time from ordering the SSD and getting it to Taiwan is over a month, 39 days. I receive an email from Team Group Inc that the drive has arrived and they will tell me soon what the problem is. This is a Friday evening so I know Monday will be the earliest before I get any news.

I was wrong I had to write them on Tuesday night to get my information by Wednesday night.

The answer to why the SSD was DOA was some bad solider points (see image), the drive would be repaired and tested then shipped back to me. A cold solider joint will seperate when enough heat is applied, thus causing the device to fail.

Friday I receive an email saying my drive will be shipped back to me on the following day. Saturday I receive an email with a tracking number. I reply to that email inquiring as to what was the defect. The reply was they don't track failures but would check for me. No report available out side of the factory but they sent me an image (see image) of the problem. Seems that some of the solder joints were of low quality and when the drive heated up they separated.

I received my drive 53 days after I purchased it, yes it does work, yes I could have opened it and fixed the cold solder joint (the low quality solder point) myself but the drive had a warranty seal. If I had opened the drive and done the repair but it didn't fix the problem then I would have been out $140 that it cost to buy and ship to me from Ireland.

So the moral of the story -

[sigh] Buy cheap, get cheap. Two months to get an operational device is too long.

The bad part? I can not rely on this device - Team 2.5" Combo SATA Solid State Disk - SSD - S25AC1 - to be as robust as I want and will have to buy another one. So I will have a device that I can use for short term experiments though.

The Review:

I am giving the company Team Group Inc 3 out of 10. The manufacturing and quality are of very low quality. The fact that the company will not accept phone calls on a RMA for failed parts out of the box is very poor customer service. Also the fact that all correspondence takes a minimum of 48 hours to complete is also very poor customer service. The lack of contact or policy on the corporate web site does not endure me to them as a future customer. Buying a product and having to wait almost two months to use it makes me want to buy elsewhere and maybe so should you.

Discover how to upgrade, troubleshoot, or repair your computer the easy way with the Self Computer Repair Unleashed! E-Book

Are you a member?
Does your Computer need some TLC?
You think there is a lot here - You should see what there is in the
DIY Membership Section!

Hard Drives, Internal or External, All available at Newegg.com

Q and A
This site contains a lot of information. As with any publication not all information is available due to space, time, or subject constraints.

If you have a question that you did not find the answer on this web site you a can ask your question here and we will endeavor to get you the most up to date answer possible!

Free Stuff!

Thank you for visiting my web site, and please come back again.